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The Best Game All Year

This past Sunday I attended the best football game I’ve been to in a long time and it had absolutely nothing to do with the University of Notre Dame varsity football. At ND, Interhall Football is taken very seriously. There’s a whole season, playoffs and the championship games are in the stadium. The men even play full contact with full pads. It’s hardcore. Anyway, this season the Cavanaugh Chaos (the dorm in which I am head staff) had just an excellent team. The best part is that they weren’t some kind of monster, mowing down every team in their path. They had regular-season losses, but kept plugging away and getting better and better. They made the playoffs and quickly trounced Pangborn and Farley Halls to make the championship game against Welsh Family Hall.

The Welsh Family Hall Whirlwinds are a juggernaut. They went undefeated in the regular season and seemed poised to win another Interhall championship. Until they met up with the Cavanaugh Chaos on Sunday November 18th, 2007. The first half was a grind-it-out defensive battle. The Whirlwinds got down inside the 10 twice and both times the Cavanaugh defense held ’em and they turned it over on downs (we don’t kick field goals).

At halftime, our fans (hundreds of girls, parents, friends and boyfriends) were entertained with our very own Cavanaugh marching band, comprised of the girls in the dorm who play in the ND marching band and a few of their male friends to round out the percussion section. They had a little show, with formations and everything!

First they went around in a circle,
then they made a line and did a twirl
then they made a C for Cavanaugh:

In the second half, our offense came out fired up and we scored on our first possession. The crowd went nuts, putting girls up in push-ups the way the student section does for regular ND football games. The band kept right on playing pep band music and we had a ton of cheers going on the sidelines. My personal favorite was the one I started for our QB, Katie Dunn. “DUNN FOR HEISMAN [clap clap clap-clap-clap]!” She’s a junior and she’s awesome. Throws like Peyton Manning and scrambles like Vince Young. She operates out of the shot-gun and I’ve seen her audible from the line. We think now that Dennis Dixon’s gone down (sad), she’s got a real chance. Tebow, schmebow. We also hope she doesn’t declare for the draft because we’d like to see if she can repeat next year.

After our first score, the Whirlwinds held us and we were forced to punt it away. Kim Halpin, one of my awesome RAs, had a ridiculous 40-yard punt to pin the Whirlwinds back. She should probably be kicking for Notre Dame this year. Our defense came out and held the Whirlwinds AGAIN. With about 90 seconds left we scored a second time. Welsh had one last drive to try and score, but we held ’em until time expired and the Chaos were victorious 14-0. We rushed the field, took pictures and got our trophy. It was the most exciting football game I’ve been to in years. At least Notre Dame Stadium got to see some fun, awesome football this year.

This is why I wish I had participated more in college life. I was so anxious to leave the campus as soon as classes ended that I missed so much of this stuff. I made up for it somewhat in law school, but you don’t have the same time like you did in college.

Congrats Andie! Your post makes me nostalgic for my intramural days. We had a QB that actually broke a couple of our WR’s fingers w/her laser rocket arm and even had the same sweet socks (though ours were blue & white). But alas, the best we ever did was 4th place.

Now that’s organized – how great that they let you play in the stadium with the scoreboard and everything. That’s pretty sweet.

I dabbled in intramural/tourament flag football in college – it was pretty intense. I wasn’t very good – but I understood the game well enough to know what needed to be done – I couldn’t catch or throw but if we needed one yard, I could get it, and I could blanket a key receiver. I broke my nose in one tournament game – I thought I’d died. We came in 4th that year – and we got a little trophy – It was easily my proudest moment.

CONGRATS! i graduated from ND in ’02, lived in breen-phillips all four years, and made it to the championship game in the stadium when i was a freshman (i started on the d-line that year). we got our asses handed to us by PE, but it was wicked cool to play in the stadium. here, have some visual evidence: my and my girls back in the day in the stadium. (i’m the second from the left. GOD THAT WAS AGES AGO. eee.) again, so happy for you!